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No Doctor For You: How The Federal Government Is Chasing Millions Of Good Doctors Out Of The Medical Profession

By Michael Snyder, on January 5th, 2012

Most Americans do not realize this, but we are on the verge of a major doctor shortage in the United States. All over America, good doctors are going broke. The way that our health care system is currently set up, they simply cannot make it. These days a lot of politicians are warning us about the dangers of “socialized medicine”, but the truth is that we already have it. About half of all health care dollars in the United States are now spent by the federal government, and a lot of health insurance companies base reimbursements on what the federal government does. In addition, there are a whole host of parasites that have gotten between the doctor and the patient these days. Everyone wants a piece of the health care pie. Health insurance companies, pharmaceutical giants, lawyers, health care “administrators” and government bureaucrats all make a sweet living off of the doctor/patient relationship. It really is sickening. And now Obamacare is going to make things much, much worse. As you will read about later in this article, a stunning percentage of doctors say that they plan to leave the medical profession because of Obamacare. What this means is that we are headed for a chronic doctor shortage and there is a good chance that there will be no doctor for you when you really need one in the years ahead.

Today, approximately 40 percent of all doctors in the United States are 55 years of age or older. Large numbers of them are getting ready to retire.

Even before Obamacare was passed, we were already facing a massive shortage of doctors in the coming years. The American Association of Medical Colleges has projected that we will experience a shortage of more than 150,000 doctors over the next 15 years.

Unfortunately, the passage of Obamacare is going to make this crisis even worse. A whole host of surveys have shown that a massive number of doctors in America are headed for the exits because of the new health care law….

*According to a Merritt Hawkins survey of 2,379 doctors for the Physicians Foundation that was conducted in August 2010, 40 percent of all U.S. doctors plan to “retire, seek a nonclinical job in health care, or seek a job or business unrelated to health care” at some point over the next three years.

*A shocking IBD/TPP Poll taken in 2010 found that 45 percent of all U.S. doctors are considering leaving the medical profession or retiring early as a result of Obamacare.

At the moment, there are approximately 960,000 doctors in the United States.

So what is going to happen if a couple hundred thousand of them suddenly leave the medical profession?

Health-care reform will add an estimated 32 million people to the ranks of the insured, driving them to seek medical attention that in the past they may have avoided due to expense. The aging population will also create much greater demand. The number of seniors who need more medical care is expected to soar to 72 million by 2020—nearly double today’s number.

So what is going to happen if the number of doctors starts declining rapidly?

Most Americans think of doctors as being “wealthy”, but that is not the reality of what is going on out there these days as a recent CNN article explained….

Doctors in America are harboring an embarrassing secret: Many of them are going broke.

This quiet reality, which is spreading nationwide, is claiming a wide range of casualties, including family physicians, cardiologists and oncologists.

Americans spend more on health care than anyone else in the world and yet thousands upon thousands of doctors are going broke.

How can that be?

Well, one huge contributing factor is the mismanagement of the federal government.

Existing government programs already reimburse physicians at rates that are often less than the actual cost of treating a patient. Estimates suggest that on average physicians are reimbursed at roughly 78% of costs under Medicare, and just 70% of costs under Medicaid. Physicians must either make up for this shortfall by shifting costs to those patients with insurance — meaning those of us with insurance pay more — or treat patients at a loss.

So guess who has to make up the difference?

You and I.

When we go to see the doctor we get smacked with a huge bill in order to make up for the Medicare and Medicaid patients.

Things have gotten so bad that a lot of doctors won’t even see Medicare and Medicaid patients anymore.

Just check out what some researchers found when they called around to doctors in Illinois back in 2010. The following comes from an article in the New York Times….

The study used a “secret shopper” technique in which researchers posed as the parent of a sick or injured child and called 273 specialty practices in Cook County, Ill., to schedule appointments. The callers, working from January to May 2010, described problems that were urgent but not emergencies, like diabetes, seizures, uncontrolled asthma, a broken bone or severe depression. If they were asked, they said that primary care doctors or emergency departments had referred them.

Sixty-six percent of those who mentioned Medicaid-CHIP (Children’s Health Insurance Program) were denied appointments, compared with 11 percent who said they had private insurance, according to an article being published Thursday in The New England Journal of Medicine.

Today, one out of every 6 Americans is on Medicaid. Without Medicaid, millions of children would not receive health care.

But now large numbers of doctors are rejecting patients on Medicaid because they simply cannot afford to treat them.

And now as Obamacare is fully implemented over the next few years it is going to make our health care mess a whole lot worse.

Obamacare is going to burden our doctors with a gigantic mountain of new regulations and red tape. It is going to become incredibly difficult to make a living as a doctor and the federal government is going to be pretty much running the entire health care system.

Did you know that Obamacare is so oppressive that it is even causing the cancellation of new hospitals?

In addition, as Obamacare is fully rolled out the wait to see a doctor is likely to get much longer. If you urgently need to see a doctor you may simply be out of luck.

If you doubt this, just check out what happened in Massachusetts. As a result of Romneycare, the average wait to see a doctor in Massachusetts is now much, much longer….

In fact, we have already seen the start of this process in Massachusetts, where Mitt Romney’s health care reforms were nearly identical to President Obama’s. Romney’s reforms increased the demand for health care but did nothing to expand the supply of physicians. In fact, by cracking down on insurance premiums, Massachusetts pushed insurers to reduce their payments to providers, making it less worthwhile for doctors to expand their practices. As a result, the average wait to get an appointment with a doctor grew from 33 days to over 55 days.

Is that the kind of health care system that you want?

The more doctors that leave the system, the worse that things are going to get.

We need a system where doctors can make a living. It is just as simple as that.

Beau Donegan, senior executive with a hospital cancer center in Newport Beach, Calif., is well aware of physicians’ financial woes.

“Many are too proud to admit that they are on the verge of bankruptcy,” she said. “These physicians see no way out of the downward spiral of reimbursement, escalating costs of treating patients and insurance companies deciding when and how much they will pay them.”

Donegan knows an oncologist “with a stellar reputation in the community” who hasn’t taken a salary from his private practice in over a year. He owes drug companies $1.6 million, which he wasn’t reimbursed for.

The following is another example from that same article….

Dr. Neil Barth is that oncologist. He has been in the top 10% of oncologists in his region, according to U.S. News Top Doctors’ ranking. Still, he is contemplating personal bankruptcy.

That move could shutter his 31-year-old clinical practice and force 6,000 cancer patients to look for a new doctor.

Are you starting to get the picture?

There are already not enough doctors, and the number of doctors is going to continue to decline unless something is done.

We need to fundamentally restructure the way that health care is done in the United States. What we are doing now is not working, and Obamacare is going to make things much worse.

Today, the average medical school student graduates with over $295,000 of student loan debt.

So if doctors can’t make any money, then where is the incentive to go into so much debt?

Something has gone very wrong.

It isn’t as if we are not spending enough money on health care. Just consider the following stats….

-The chairman of Aetna, the third largest health insurance company in the United States, brought in a staggering $68.7 million during 2010. Ron Williams exercised stock options that were worth approximately $50.3 million and he raked in an additional $18.4 million in wages and other forms of compensation. The funny thing is that he left the company and didn’t even work the whole year.

-According to the CDC, the percentage of Americans that say that they have taken a prescription drug within the last month has risen to almost 50 percent.

-Lawyers are certainly doing their part to contribute to soaring health care costs. According to one recent study, the medical liability system in the United States added approximately $55.6 billion to the cost of health care in 2008.

Are you starting to understand?

This gigantic mess is causing an increasing number of Americans to seek medical care outside of the country. According to numbers released by Deloitte Consulting, a whopping 875,000 Americans were “medical tourists” in 2010.

Our health care system is irretrievably broken. The federal government has messed it up beyond all recognition and it is not going to get better any time soon.

It used to be, that doctors actually cared about people – they even made these individual visits called “house calls”. You may have seen movies or old black and white TV shows about that. Some guy with a black bag and a stephoscope (spelling?) knocking at your front door, after you gave him a call at 3am.

1952, yes. 2012, no way. These days, it’s off to the ER or Urgent Care (if they are open!)

Doctor house calls have gone the way of the milkman, the paper boy, and soon the postman, the last of a dying breed. In other words, the last person who will make a daily visit to your home, say hello to the wife and kids, and ask how they are doing.. (Mark my words, the postman is on the way out. The USPS is already practically broke.) I don’t even get salesmen knocking at my door anymore!

The medical profession has gone the way of the education and legal professions: “We’re only in it for the money”.

P.S. By the way – your mailman/woman knows more about you than you think. After all, they send you your bills, Netflix DVD’s, letters from your pen pal in Hungary, etc…..

mondobeyondo

The United States has the best health care in the world. That is generally regarded to be true….

IF YOU CAN AFFORD IT.

The average American can not afford it. Not with employer-sponsored insurance plans, and if you are unemployed and have no insurance at all, heaven help you. $15,000 hospital expenses for a broken arm? Really?!?

Why do wealthy foreigners and heads of state travel to the U.S. when they have a major illness? (for example, the Shah of Iran)

Because….The United States has the best health care in the world…IF YOU CAN AFFORD IT!

Most foreign leaders are not on food stamps, or struggling to feed their princes and princesses. They don’t worry about the monthly electric bill or gas bill to light their palace or mansion.

But you do. That’s the difference.

Ben Dover

Didn’t some high level politician from Canada recently come to USA for medical care?

Gary2

excellent insight!

The United States has the best health care in the world. That is generally regarded to be true….

IF YOU CAN AFFORD IT.

mark

First get rid of the laywers from the medical system. Maybe the Libs that run the college system could cut their wages so that Med school costs are lower. My doctor is not happy making around 150,000 a year. Cut the costs to bring new drugs to market. Get rid of government mandates and let people purchase the insurance they want. Sorry, but the privlege to see a doctor is not a right if you do not have the money to pay for it. It seems that the only right we have is to die at some point in our lives and we all die at different ages. We can only lower costs if we are willing to take more risk with healthcare and not turn around and sue the doctor when things don’t work out.

A Dodgy Bloke

This really doesn’t surprise me, any regular reader of UK papers on line knows the on going nightmare that the National Health Service. The problem is you still have you many loons who think with enough money Government can solve anything. It can’t as Brian Tracy “government takes all the power but leaves you with ultimate responsibility.” Anybody on public assistance knows this. OH BTW for further giggles see the two articles below. Have a happy nightmare. :>)

Armageddon, right on schedule. This is what the globalists want, a neo-fuedal society in which civilization as anyone knew it ceases to exist.

Sorry, Charlie, there is no stopping it. With the masses totally oblivious as to what is going on and to stupid to care, it’s not a matter of if there will be a total collapse, but a matter of when that collapse will occur………..

sc

Micheal,

I want to thank you for your articles. I love this and the economic collapse blog.com as well. I read both everyday and can’t thank you enough for your work and information.

I am interested in your insight about our agriculture system and how our food supply is so corrupt and poisoned. Could you possibly write on this subject? So much has to do with our immigration issues and the subsidizing of corn crops and corporate farming of our animals and produce. I don’t think enough people are aware of how messed up that is as well.

Michael

SC:

I think that would be a great article to do. If anyone has some good links for a story like that, please post them. Before I do a story I try to gather some good information first.

And thanks for reading the sites on a regular basis. May you and your family be greatly blessed in 2012.

Michael

anne

The insurance industry is going to take the whole Health Care industry down in America. I work for a company that in order to get rates that you should get anyway, you have to weigh in, get blood taken, have a test for tobacco and in some cases get cholesterol measured also. SO, the assumption is not like car insurance, where if you use the insurance or get a ticket (health care equivalent, get diagnosed with a disease) you pay more. In this system, you pay more if they just think you might you use the system more. It’s all corrupt.

http://www.1913intel.com Matt

You are looking at this entire medical system problem incorrectly. It’s not about good medical care. It’s about equal medical care.

Before ObamaCare there were 30 to 40 million people that had no medical care, or delayed medical care. These were the poor – the unsuccessful. Now, thanks to ObamaCare, the burden of no medical care, or delayed medical care, has been shifted to all of society equally. That means most of the burden goes to the successful.

The general idea is that the successful cheated, and the unsuccessful were their victims. Now we must drag down the successful and lift up the unsuccessful. ObamaCare does that.

So stop thinking this is about better medical care. It’s all about equally crappy medical care.

Dr. Detroit

Heres a thought if nobody had health insurance at all, wouldn’t the overall price of health care come down? I think it would maybe procedures wouldn’t cost 100k to do?

Gary2

Michael please-there is no evidence that tort reform/malpractice reforms reduce costs and in fact where states have implemented tort reform malpractice costs are the same or higher than states w/o tort reform. Tort reform is political; payback to repube doners plain and simple.

Consider that we spend way more than the “single payer” nations yet rank #37 in outcomes.

The real death panels are insurance companies. Thank heavens for Obama care (your pejorative term) now my son in college can be on my plan.

The only fix (and even some right wingers agree) is single payer. costs can be tightly controlled (ie doctors make less aww too bad for them)

Medicare has a 3% overhead cost where as the PRIVATE insurance has 30% Duh that is where the money is-to obscene insurance executives pockets.

The best outcome is for the supreme court to say Obamacare is unconstitutional because then we will fast track to single payer as that is already constitutional.

Michael

Actually now we will have two sets of death panels – the Obamacare death panels AND the health insurance death panels.

I hope that none of you out there get really sick.

Michael

REED RICHARDS

Michael,

Too many dates with Sarah Palin? There are no Obamacare death panels. And any death panels that are there existed long before Obama himself came onto the scene. Obamacare is merely the the big pharma banker style bailout. It did nothing to alter the health care system as is except burden the taxpayer. But it is clearly a lie to say there are death panels in Obamacare.

Gary2

Michael says those absurd things to throw red meat to some of his conservative low information readers. He is way too smart to actually believe this.

knightowl77

If you and Gary keep repeating that then I am sure that it is true…./sarc

Silver of Gold

Negative. Whenever Gov gets involved in a industry it always increases prices. Higher Ed, Real Estate, and now Health Care. Just wait as the Gov is now involved in Agriculture with POS Monsato. When the time is to their advantage they will artificially create shortages in food and millions, perhaps BILLIONs will die from malnutrition and starvation curtsey of us–US tax payers. Hope you enjoy sleeping at night cause this type of ****** makes me stay up, peace.

Ben Dover

If you think medical care is expensive now, wait until it’s free.

Gary2

Did you know that Obamacare is so oppressive that it is even causing the cancellation of new hospitals?

This is good-we do not need most of the new hospitals that are being built. Here in the Milwaukee area there is a big healthcare chain that WAY overbuilds when it is not needed and this drives up the cost. This is a documented fact.

Gary2

When I was on vacation in Canada—(back when I had a living wage job and could afford to take a family vacation) I ran out of 2 prescriptions and the cost to refill a 90 day supply paying cash was less than my co-pay here in the USA.

Reread that. no wonder people in Northern WI charter buses to get their drugs from Canada. Oh that right, that socialized medicine thing…we need more of that here!

Gary2

Wendell Potter-google this -he can articulate the problem and the solution.

doug berry

Check out the story about the chimeric monkeys—made up of 6 different “parents” and given the names “Roku” and “Hex”, which mean “six” in Japanese and Greek, respectively. Funny how 666 keeps popping-up! Antichrist healthcare for primates, I guess.

Concerned person

And the level of care has gone down immensely. My husband and I are only in our 30’s and we both almost died because of shoddy healthcare we were given because we were on Medicaid.

I was allowed to hemmorhage for hours after giving birth last year because the hospital was not interested in spending any money on transfusions. I was almost dead when they finally decided I deserved them – I needed two of them. I was released with almost half the plaenta still inside me and it took another hospital to save my life. A month later the doctor who saved me expressed shock that I was walking around and ok, he had expected me to die. None of this was necessary, it was all from negligence.

My husband almost died of kidney failure which the hospital treated with laxatives for some reason and not dialysis. Thank God it reversed itself.

My husband then lost his job because of the kidney failure and neither of us has insurance. God help us if either of us gets sick. At this point, I might just get some home remedy book off the internet and treat myself.

Michael

Thank you for sharing those personal stories. One of these days I should do an article about medical horror stories. Our health care system is so messed up now that it is hard to even put into words.

Michael

Concerned person

When I put a complaint a month later (it took me that long to recover and feel my normal self again) their excuse was – get this – I could have gotten AIDS or hepatitis from a transfusion so they didn’t want to take the risk. Are you freaking kidding?? I had lost a third of all the blood in my body and that’s what they were thinking of? Yeah right.

What on earth happened to the America we all grew up in?

An ordinary Catholic pharmacist

Disagreeing with Mark. He doesn’t have a grasp. Sorry to say. Average person doesnt’ have a grasp. From an ordinary Catholic pharmacist’s prospective graduating pharmacy school in the 80s. (Been around a while. Worked in an independent pharmacy. Seen demise of the independent pharmacy. Worked in the VA system. Saw the impact of congressional appropriations committees’ delaying whether to fund VA system in 1988-1989. Seen the impact of generic drug industry. Seen the impact of bogus ‘medicine’. More recently seen the shamefulness of politicians arranging elder trips across American borders into Canada. Seen the impact of immigrants’ national medical ‘care’ from Mexico–stores sell penicillin injections from behind the counter if the patient thinks they need a shot. Seen the drug company shenanigans. Seen (and felt) impact of American ‘health care’ insurance brokers dictating scientific decisions for the average consumer to doctors and pharmacists with 6+ years of medical training. Seen what happens in specific medical situations from a lack of funding by insurers, governments, states, etc. Seen the effect of ignorance.

Seen a lot of things in the last thirty years as a medical student and professional. Somewhere somehow people are going to be able to wake up to the fact that what’s going on now is class ‘warfare’ and our US government is going to have to pick up the slack of the rampant disregard for American citizens as a whole instead of expecting individual capitalists and individual corporations to be anything more or better than individual greedy monsters.

Proof of Purchase

Part of the problem with the medical profession is that it is intimately tied into the government/pharmaceutical/medical care monopoly. Most physicians these days are mere technicians and don’t practice medicine like in the old days, where there was much more common sense in medical practitioners and their use of patented medicines and naturopathy worked together for the best outcome. That is not to say that present day medicine doesn’t have its examples of mini-miracles, etc.- it’s just that the system on the whole is inefficient, oftentimes useless and very often causes more harm than good.
As the economy and medical care in general collapses, websites like http://www.doctoryourself.com may fill the gap with naturopathic alternatives which may be beneficial in many instances. In any event, it appears to be where we are headed.

Concerned person

Thanks for the link. I’m definitely going to check that out.

Cinderella Man

Thanks for letting me know that CHIP is a total fraud and waste of money. It makes me feel so much better that the extra taxes I pay on my packs of cigarettes are going to a worthy cause. CHIP is such BS. Most of the poor familes with children are using Medicaid, and not even taking advantage of CHIP. But does the state refund this money? Of course not! Nope our day of reckoning is almost here. I guarantee when BarryCare gets here, good doctors will leave in droves, to be replaced with semi-skilled Turd World doctors, and yaaay! Gary2 and Michael Moore’s dream of Cuban healthcare will be here along with Cuban doctors! Awesome! Did we say Death Panels? Oh we meant Happy Panels! With lots of Happy Pills to ease your suffering into your next life! The VA is already rationing care. For example my parents: Both Marine Corps vets, both needing expensive care. First, my mom, she needs to have surgery to fix a hiatial hernia, nope! Second, my Dad still waiting on an appointment with a cardiologist! Rationing is here my friends! Just wait till your Granny is refused her life saving heart surgery and is given a (death) hrrrmm… I mean Happy Pill intead. Its already here. Just open your eyes.

Cinderella Man

Mondo is not far off on his cost for a broken arm, I broke my wrist in the summer of ’10 and had no insurance, so my bill was close to $5,000! The hospitials rape you HARD if you have no insurance, and there is a man suing St.Petes in Helena for overcharging customers without insurance. I hope he wins. Another reason to hate illegals. If Juan and Maria hurt themselves or swims across to have their anchor baby, since they have no SS numbers they will never be turned over to a collection agency, to have their wages garnished to pay back their debts. This infuriates me to no end. This is also part of the skyrocketing cost of medical care, just retard liberals dont care.

Concerned person

Yes they do. For a week’s worth of laxatives and painkillers to treat kidney failure (which was misdiagnosed as chronic, thank God it’s not) we now owe the hospital over 20 grand. My husband’s blood pressure skyrocketed and that was untreated, leaving my husband with blurry vision that lasted weeks.

Bankruptcy here we come.

We were uninsured because my husband’s insurance hadn’t kicked in yet, he just started working. And then he got fired for “taking off so much time”.

There is no compassion in this society. At all. It’s every man for himself. Not even family members give a damn about their own anymore.

Judas Jones

This article is pure bovine excretion

Peter Wehlin

There is only one way to go -abort the money system and replace it by heart and reason!

DaytoDay

Well, back in 2005, Friends were telling me about how their parents would drive to Mexico, to get their meds and to see a doctor, because it was much cheaper. I live in AZ so, a quick drive to mexico is doable.

Also, my moms a nurse (35 years), and she has always said that medicare/medicare patients were last on the list. Now, they don’t even make it…

What’s happening to this country is more than sad, it is ridiculous.

mondobeyondo

Doc: “Open your mouth and say “ahhh”
Me: “Okay…”
Doc: “Yes, I’ve confirmed it. You’re sick. That’ll be 300 dollars.”
Me: “Yeah, I knew that already. That’s why I came to see you! Why the $300?
Doc: “Because I’m a doctor, and I am a professional.”
Me: “But I knew that I was sick already! I was vomiting and so forth…”
Doc: “But remember, I’m a doctor. I’m trained in diagnosing your illnesses. That’ll be an extra $500.00 for that.”…..

Anonymous

Everyone is getting rich in health care except the ones who actually deal with patients. Lawyers, medical supply companies, pharmaceuticals, insurance brokers, nursing home owners, government bureaucrats, etc. America has been stiffing doctors for years, now the overseas doctors will find it more profitable to stay overseas.

June

Remember, there is another cost that the American taxpayer is burdened with. That is the cost of medical csre for illegal aliens. Doctors must treat them gratis, and the cost is passed along to us. Illegals cost us over 100 billion yearly for all phases or their upkeep. If we had leaders with the courage to stop the invasion, medical costs as well as the economy would be greatly improved. There would also be a drop in the crime rate. Why won’t Washington do something about this instead of threatning seniors with cutting deep into Social Security or Medicare? We’re the ones who put you in Washington…not the illegals (wait, maybe they did). After all the DOH would like anyone who wants to be able to vote.

pete

don’t you people know that these stories are made up or exaggerated and the numbers made up?
the wall street journal is owned by Ruper Murdoch, whose newspapers print b.s. stories based on his political beliefs.
conservatives lie to support their points, that is well known by everyone except the sheep followers.
do you think health care was better under Bush? These insurance and Health companies own Republican politicians, that’s why everything is a mess, and you believe everything the corporate lobbyists say.

if you believe these scare stories, look back 10, 20 and more years. the sky has been falling for a long time…

Politely Pointing Out

Medicine is practiced insanely in the United States. As an exclusive allopathic practice, it probably does more harm than good. As a practice where allopathic practices are combined with naturopathic/nutritional practices, then medicine can be very rewarding for both doctors and patients.
The type of care will have to be changed, with more reliance on common sense and things that actually promote health, rather than much of the high tech lunacy which is tried.
Relying on nurse practitioners, more lay professionals and websites such as http://www.doctoryourself.com will do more to promote health and address the current problems we face.
Of course, it is somewhat disturbing that all of these doctors are leaving the profession, but many are not providing a necessary cost benefit when practicing medicine.

Groener

I used to work in the health insurance. The money is good if one is near the top. I myself did OK until my dept was downsized.

I will say that I liked the current system before the downsizing.

http://www.paulslegacyproject.org Ilene Flannery Wells

The for-profit health insurance system is primarily responsible. They are the ones that start the lawsuits too. HR 676 the bill to enact single payer health insurance is the way to go. I also ensures it because it would bring true parity for people with a mental illness.

Doctors and Insurance company execs are sociopaths and denying someone health care because they have no money is against the Hippocratic Oath and the attitude of sociopaths

Truth

Well, blaming the government of pitying the doctors does not solve the problem. The question you should be asking yourself is that “Why does medical care cost a lot in the USA”. They are all kinds of doctors in the U.S.A and some of the best are in the military. You know why? Because the military paid for their school and they in turn are giving back to the military by rendering their services for less than what the average doctor in a non-military hospital will do. So that gives you a hints that maybe, if medical schools start giving people incentives to attend school for free and graduate with no loan yet render their services to the community at low rates, that may improve the cost of care. No one ever said doctors have to charge more to cover up the cost of heavy loans incurred while going to school. Becoming a dr should not be a matter of rich or poor or loans and no loans. It should those with the brains who are trained to do the job with the reward of offering their services to the sick and not for profit making. If doctors are hoping to make money through people getting sick, then there are already defeating the purpose of their profession. Remember many of those that travel to receive care outside the country still get treated by other doctors who probably charging less than they do in the U.S.A. So get politics out of this and focus on the real issue. A famous physician once said, what America needs is a medical education that can is within the reach of ordinary citizens. If that be the case, then many medical schools will be graduating doctors each year who can readily serve their own community and take care of the sick regardless of whether they are rich or poor, insured or not.

RD

Didn’t we used to pay doctors with a chicken or something?
Miss the good ole days.

Jay the health nut

The whole thing is completely pathetic. I totally agree that the healthcare system in all Western countries is in complete shambles, but the problem goes well beyond Obamacare. The brutal reality is that good doctors are leaving the profession every day, and we are left with a bunch of good for nothing IDIOTS. As a result, too many people are dropping dead of diseases that are either preventable or shouldn’t kill anybody. Just the other day, a co worker was telling me about her husband’s horrific death from metastitized prostate cancer, a disease that I am probably going to have when I’m in my sixties (it runs extensively in the men on my daddy’s side). Prostate cancer is close to 100% curable when detected early. Look at Rudy Giuliani; look at Robert DeNiro; Look at my father. If only this idiot doctor had ordered PSA tests every year, my co worker’s husband would still be alive. After that I learned that prostate cancer is the leading cause of cancer related death in Canada. The very thought of this is revolting, because NO ONE should die from this disease. If modern medicine has come so far and is so great, then why are people dying of prostate cancer? Or strep throat? Or diabetes? Or other diseases that shouldn’t be brutal killers…

Meanwhile, my mother was recently hospitalized with pneumonia. She had to fight to be able to take her own prescribed pain medications for arthritis and an autoimmune disease. When she was admitted, she was being cared for not by real doctors, but by teenage interns. Her life was in their very hands. I truly believe that the people who take care of us actually want us to be sick and miserable. Notice how none of them talk about disease PREVENTION? They tout their angiograms, chemo drugs, and insulin like they are miracle cures. By the way, you should know this: certain diabetes drugs cause aggressive adult leukemias. This happened to another co worker’s brother. He was dead in ten days.

You want to know why our medical establishment is like this? Because when we get multiple sclerosis, tumors, and strokes, these imbeciles make A LOT OF MONEY!!!! You know who else makes a lot of money? The American Cancer Society and the American Heart Association! The American Cancer Society calls itself the official sponsor of birthdays, and as the statistics show they are doing a lousy job. Every time I see those “closer to free” ads touting all the progress we’ve made in curing cancer, I want to vomit. Some of the tests used to detect cancer actually cause it. Surviving five years and dying at 50 is considered a “success.” These people, too, are making big bucks off of death, disease, and misery. That’s why they never talk about cancer and heart disease prevention. They certainly don’t mention that MAYBE if we didn’t drink fluoride, lead, and chlorine every f%$#*&g day, we’d prevent a lot of health problems. Wink wink; nudge nudge. Yet, we aren’t “closer to free;” we are “closer to hell.” Those who make money off of these illnesses blame bad luck. I blame them, and I also blame modern life.

Recently, my mother’s old college boyfriend, who is now 64, was diagnosed with a stage 3 or 4 throat cancer. It should have been diagnosed a year before. The main reason he survived is because his cancer was caused by a virus (HPV-16), a sexually transmitted disease. Had it been caused by his tobacco use, I have little doubt that he would be dead.

He also owes his survival to the persistence of his spouse, and not the wisdom of the ACS or the a$$holes in charge. Poor guy is 64 years old and should be getting ready to enjoy his golden years. Instead, he’s recovering from brutal stone age style surgeries and damage to his optic nerve.

My advice is this: Sponsor your own birthdays by TAKING CARE OF YOURSELF, because you can’t count on your doctor to take care of you anymore. Eat organic raw greens, berries, vegetable sprouts, and berries. If a caveman didn’t eat it, you shouldn’t either! Get the flouride, BPAs, lead, and unnecessary dental x rays out. Get the mass produced soaps and shampoos out too. You have no idea just how many disease causing chemicals are in there. Exercise regularly. Don’t grill your meat. Think twice about oral sex; that is how HPV-16 gets into your throat. Get your PSA tests and colonoscopies even when the doctor says you don’t need them. I’m 28, and starting in about 7-10 years, I will get PSA tests annually. My doctor says to start at 45, but I’m taking charge. Don’t hold your cell phone up to your head, and don’t depend on it for everything, because you and your children might soon lose the ability to talk. Above all, don’t be afraid to go in the opposite direction of modern life. If you stay the course, you will end up obese, sick, miserable, and dead. Still, the hospital will love you, because you will be giving them a lot of money. Buena Suerte, Amigos!

Docwithavoice

This is well written and sadly so true. I am a physician and will soon exit healthcare. Had I known the mess that the government, insurance companies, lawyers and hospital administrators would make of healthcare, instead of going into medicine I would have run in the other direction. I chose to enter healthcare nearly 20 years ago because of my own adverse health care experience. Once in it, I understood with clarity why my experience was so bad. I am a passionate visionary so I believed early on in my career that I could potential help to change things. What a joke! What I have learned since is that many doctors are a part of their own problem. Nearly 30 years ago, it was doctors that gave up their control in healthcare. Nearly 30 years ago, it was insurance companies and hospitals that wanted to control healthcare as well as the flow of healthcare dollars into their pockets. The law that help that desire come to fruition was a law called the Healthcare Quality Improvement Act. This law had done nothing to improve the quality of healthcare. The only thing it has done is help insurance companies, their administrators, hospitals and their administrators, corporate lawyers, and politicians get rich while doctors would slowly go broke and get marginalized in the healthcare structure. The very people who know the most about healthcare are the ones that now no one listens to. This is also why people are dying. I have been very disgusted with what I have seen and experienced on this journey. I started my own practice out of residency naively thinking that this would give me the “freedom” to practice quality healthcare. The only thing I accomplished was doubling my debt, ensuring that I would never get from under it. I have always been outspoken and I am an advocate for what is right. In being so I became a target that hospital administrators wanted to professionally assassinate. I am blessed to be very skilled in my specialty and as a result hospitals have made a lot of money off of me even though I saw little return for my time training, being disciplined and being a proficient clinician. However, these greedy scoundrels will never be happy until they have total control over every doctor. This includes not only what they do but also what they say. Most people fail to realize that not only does the CEO, CFO and COO’s make millions but so does the Chief Nursing Officer(CNO). This person is simply a nurse who received a Bachelors in Nursing and a Master’s degree in business. Neither of these equal the years of rigorous training of the physician. But nurses also lobbied for power and now they have more influence over healthcare than the doctor. Doctors today can be easily sabotaged by nurses which has placed much fear in many of them. Few will “buck” the system and compromise the little bit of money they are able to make. This is another reason people are dying.

You astutely stated that all the good doctors will be gone. This is exactly what is happening. The best and the brightest know they are not limited and are current preparing an exit strategy out of medicine. Mediocre doctors will stay because they can be bought and are also too lazy to go back to school to do something different. I went to medical school with a lot of idiots who had no compassion, no common sense, no ethics and no skills except at taking standardized tests. I worry not only for myself as I am now in my 40’s and will eventually need care but I also worry for my children. I do not believe there will be quality doctors out there when they are old enough and sick enough to really need on. I will do everything in my power to discourage my children from entering healthcare. I do not want them to enter a thankless and incentive less profession. I truly believe that the best and the brightest minds will steer clear of Medicine. Many of my patients are fearful of the outcomes in the future of medicine that lay ahead. Things are so out of control that unfortunately the state of health is a runaway train on a collision course to hell. This is so bad that it will take Divine intervention, NOT an act of Congress to prevent the quality of healthcare from plummeting into the abyss.